4 ms·

I'm not sure HN is the place for this, but it's not exactly up to me. Calling a country "Middle Eastern North Korea" in the first sentence isn't really conduciv

I'm not sure HN is the place for this, but it's not exactly up to me. Calling a country "Middle Eastern North Korea" in the first sentence isn't really conducive to a nice intellectual discussion on the merits of taking Saudi investment though. I guess what rubs me the wrong way about this is that it's very easy to write an incendiary toplevel comment. The story was posted about 35 minutes ago. Looking over the other toplevel comments, they're all pretty much like yours. And that's a common theme: deep, thoughtful comments take longer to write. So we end up having to read lots of incendiary comments for the first hour or so. EDIT: Ok, this was a mistake. Mea culpa, I didn't mean to spawn a massive subthread where people double down on the nationalistic flamewar. My apologies, and I won't do this again. Returns to quietly working on ML

baybal2 6y ago
> Calling a country "Middle Eastern North Korea" in the first sentence isn't really conducive to a nice intellectual discussion on the merits of taking Saudi investment though. Calling Saudi kingdom the Middle Eastern North Korea is the best what you can do to conduct a "nice intellectual discussion" you want. Intellectual discussion is calling things their real names. It is a total intellectual dishonesty, and hypocrisy to pretend it isn't, while trying to have any conversation about Saudi state with a straight face.
- tasogare 6y ago
  How are you justifying that term? I see nothing (geographically, politically, culturally, economically, historically, religiously, diplomatically, etc.) that could justify it even in the slightest.
  - tokai 6y ago
    Both counties are hereditary totalitarian states that kills off political opposition, are top in the world regarding human trafficking, sponsor terrorism, and generally have the worst human rights records.
    - tasogare 6y ago
      That’s very few elements of comparison, and half of that list is equally applicable to the US, in particular sponsoring terrorism (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_and_state-sponsored_terrorism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_and_state-sponso...).
- _x0ti 6y ago
  Saudi is nothing like North Korea this is just an edge lord comment. They’re completely different in a 100 ways. You can criticize the Saudi state without drawing comparisons that make no sense. “Is the best what you can do?” Really? Coming up with an inaccurate comparison is the best you can do?
  - baybal2 6y ago
    > They’re completely different in a 100 ways. No, they are remarkably similar Effectively a 1 family state, with 1 party system as a decoration — Check The few electoral opportunities are 100% rigged. Whomever wants to self-nominate gets secretly abducted, tortured, killed, and dissolved in potassium hydroxide — Check Omnipresent domestic espionage, and political inquisition — Check Adherence to a completely braindead ideology used as a loyalty litmus test — Check Complete intolerance to any deviation from official political line, and complete lack of any real political figures other than the ruling family — Check Peoples' one, and only way up through the social ladder is through the one party political institute — Check
    - rjsw 6y ago
      Think that is being a bit unfair to North Korea, none of their citizens have carried out terrorist attacks on US soil.
- SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
  Intellectual discussion doesn’t require us to minimize Saudi Arabia’s problems. The problem with “Middle Eastern North Korea” is that it drags another emotionally charged topic into the discussion for no real reason. If anyone responds, the comparison makes it sound like they're defending North Korea.
- f6v 6y ago
  Keep in mind that North Korea hasn’t been bombing anyone on a massive scale in the last 50 years.
  - tyingq 6y ago
    I think the reference is about killing your own citizens on foreign soil.
74d-fe6-2c6 6y ago
> isn't really conducive to a nice intellectual discussion on the merits of taking Saudi investment though. "nice intellectual discussion" my ass ... LOL fuck the Saudis and their money
- NeutronStar 6y ago
  More like fuck the US for giving the Saudis so much money. But go on, blame them, not yourself. After all the US is blame free.
- 74d-fe6-2c6 6y ago
  who downvotes my comment thinks it is okay to suppress women, criminalize homosexuality, cause famines in Yemen, finance global terrorism or fillet journalists. I take those downvotes with pride :)
  - dash2 6y ago
    I think it's more likely that people downvote your comment because it adds nothing but heat to the discussion.
  - dang 6y ago
    Please stop posting unsubstantive and flamebait comments to HN. We ban accounts that break the site guidelines like this. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
    - 74d-fe6-2c6 6y ago
      I get your point and understand where it's coming from. But I'd rather read more honest flamebait on HN than those obsessivly sterile technocratic sohpisms for the sake of enabling pseudo-objective debates. A lot of people here are all about constructing smart arguments which only superficially add to a deeper understanding but actually handicap it.
      - 6y ago
formerly_proven 6y ago
> Calling a country "Middle Eastern North Korea" in the first sentence isn't really conducive to a nice intellectual discussion on the merits of taking Saudi investment though. The description is accurate and not incendiary at all.
cbozeman 6y ago
If your moral system means you need deep thoughtful comments to decide whether or not you should do business with someone who murders journalists, you have a right shit moral system.

baybal2 6y ago

> Calling a country "Middle Eastern North Korea" in the first sentence isn't really conducive to a nice intellectual discussion on the merits of taking Saudi investment though. Calling Saudi kingdom the Middle Eastern North Korea is the best what you can do to conduct a "nice intellectual discussion" you want. Intellectual discussion is calling things their real names. It is a total intellectual dishonesty, and hypocrisy to pretend it isn't, while trying to have any conversation about Saudi state with a straight face.

tasogare 6y ago
How are you justifying that term? I see nothing (geographically, politically, culturally, economically, historically, religiously, diplomatically, etc.) that could justify it even in the slightest.
- tokai 6y ago
  Both counties are hereditary totalitarian states that kills off political opposition, are top in the world regarding human trafficking, sponsor terrorism, and generally have the worst human rights records.
  - tasogare 6y ago
    That’s very few elements of comparison, and half of that list is equally applicable to the US, in particular sponsoring terrorism (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_and_state-sponsored_terrorism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_and_state-sponso...).
_x0ti 6y ago
Saudi is nothing like North Korea this is just an edge lord comment. They’re completely different in a 100 ways. You can criticize the Saudi state without drawing comparisons that make no sense. “Is the best what you can do?” Really? Coming up with an inaccurate comparison is the best you can do?
- baybal2 6y ago
  > They’re completely different in a 100 ways. No, they are remarkably similar Effectively a 1 family state, with 1 party system as a decoration — Check The few electoral opportunities are 100% rigged. Whomever wants to self-nominate gets secretly abducted, tortured, killed, and dissolved in potassium hydroxide — Check Omnipresent domestic espionage, and political inquisition — Check Adherence to a completely braindead ideology used as a loyalty litmus test — Check Complete intolerance to any deviation from official political line, and complete lack of any real political figures other than the ruling family — Check Peoples' one, and only way up through the social ladder is through the one party political institute — Check
  - rjsw 6y ago
    Think that is being a bit unfair to North Korea, none of their citizens have carried out terrorist attacks on US soil.
SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
Intellectual discussion doesn’t require us to minimize Saudi Arabia’s problems. The problem with “Middle Eastern North Korea” is that it drags another emotionally charged topic into the discussion for no real reason. If anyone responds, the comparison makes it sound like they're defending North Korea.
f6v 6y ago
Keep in mind that North Korea hasn’t been bombing anyone on a massive scale in the last 50 years.
- tyingq 6y ago
  I think the reference is about killing your own citizens on foreign soil.

74d-fe6-2c6 6y ago

> isn't really conducive to a nice intellectual discussion on the merits of taking Saudi investment though. "nice intellectual discussion" my ass ... LOL fuck the Saudis and their money

NeutronStar 6y ago
More like fuck the US for giving the Saudis so much money. But go on, blame them, not yourself. After all the US is blame free.
74d-fe6-2c6 6y ago
who downvotes my comment thinks it is okay to suppress women, criminalize homosexuality, cause famines in Yemen, finance global terrorism or fillet journalists. I take those downvotes with pride :)
- dash2 6y ago
  I think it's more likely that people downvote your comment because it adds nothing but heat to the discussion.
- dang 6y ago
  Please stop posting unsubstantive and flamebait comments to HN. We ban accounts that break the site guidelines like this. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
  - 74d-fe6-2c6 6y ago
    I get your point and understand where it's coming from. But I'd rather read more honest flamebait on HN than those obsessivly sterile technocratic sohpisms for the sake of enabling pseudo-objective debates. A lot of people here are all about constructing smart arguments which only superficially add to a deeper understanding but actually handicap it.
    - 6y ago

formerly_proven 6y ago

> Calling a country "Middle Eastern North Korea" in the first sentence isn't really conducive to a nice intellectual discussion on the merits of taking Saudi investment though. The description is accurate and not incendiary at all.

cbozeman 6y ago

If your moral system means you need deep thoughtful comments to decide whether or not you should do business with someone who murders journalists, you have a right shit moral system.